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7 Gadgets Worth Getting Dad For Fathers Day

Written by: Jason Notte06/10/13 - 8:30 AM EDT

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PORTLAND, Ore. (TheStreet) -- For the fortunate among us, a father was the person who sacrificed hours of sleep comforting a crying child in the early a.m. hours, traded in his zippy commuter car for something he could use to shuttle his kids and their stuff and who hasn't watched a film with an "F" bomb in it during daylight hours in more than a decade.

Getting a Fathers Day gift he won't forget by the Fourth of July isn't too much to ask under those circumstances.

Fathers Day spending is expected to hit $13.2 billion this year, according to research firm IBISWorld. That's a 2.1% increase from last year, but that won't matter if it's being spent on afterthoughts. The $1.73 billion being spent on clothes this Fathers Day is actually down 0.3% from last year and includes the dreaded, cliched tie. It's also not a whole lot, considering folks are planning to spend the exact same amount on gift cards. Nothing says "Holy crap, it's Fathers Day" quite like a gift card picked up at the last second in a supermarket checkout lane.

In an attempt to stem the tide of disappointment and give dad something he'll remember longer than the final score of that late September baseball game you took him to because tickets were cheap and the opponent was perennially terrible, we're presenting the following seven items as humble suggestions. If even one of these gadgets is still in use by Christmas, it's doing its job: